


Enclosed

by fractualized



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Batman: The Telltale Series (Video Game)
Genre: Fluff, I'm Bad At Titles, M/M, Mental Institutions, i'm so used to having like a dozen tags surely there needs to be more, it's christmas but it doesn't really matter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:42:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21813133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fractualized/pseuds/fractualized
Summary: In Arkham's courtyard, a resolution before the new year.
Relationships: John Doe/Bruce Wayne, Joker (DCU)/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 39
Kudos: 171
Collections: These helps when I feel uneasy





	Enclosed

**Author's Note:**

> Wtf, something short?

With stone buildings blocking the outside world and the gray sky shedding snow, Arkham's courtyard feels like a snowglobe. The gardens hibernate beneath a thick blanket of white from earlier in the week, and the new flakes drift around Bruce and John as they slowly walk the cleared paths. The flakes settle in John's hair and, when he tilts his head back, turn to shining flecks on his ivory skin.

"Salvation for sanity!" he giggles. The chapel is on the edge of the asylum grounds, but the steeple juts over the dormitory roof in his and Bruce's line of sight. "Though eventually there were too many complaints about civil rights, emotional abuse, yadda yadda. You know how it goes."

Bruce had asked if John ever attended a service or prayed privately. John hasn't, but of course he knows plenty about the period when Arkham tried to use Jesus as a cure for mental illness, surely caused by some deficit in virtue or spirituality– or perhaps literal demons. Bruce would call it a dark period if darkness didn't permeate the asylum's history.

Bruce thinks this is a light period. The Wayne Foundation renewed its commitment to bettering the hospital, resulting in a slew of facility repairs and staff changes. Many policies and programs that Dr. Leland's been pushing for years have finally gotten traction, and she's on top of making sure personnel are keeping meticulous records. She and her fellow reformers know they need to prove their progress in the face of the political players who champion punishment, who call Bruce a foolish victim of soft-hearted propaganda.

Bruce cares about the ridicule as much today as when it started eighteen months ago. Much more important is that John is wearing a brand new coat, though the duck canvas is the color of rust and it's one of several coats shared among patients. Most Arkham residents are either restricted indoors or disinclined to use garden privileges to go out in the cold, so it's impractical to give everyone their own. Still, the old coats were threadbare and hadn't been washed in years.

Really, John could have any coat he wants, of any material, color, or style, but Bruce was warned. His first gift was just a book, but Leland cautioned that anything more showy could attract unwanted attention to John. Other patients had already expressed agitation that he had the favor of a billionaire.

If John needs more attention from anyone, it's staff, specifically the orderly who's supposed to be supervising the visit from the dormitory steps. Instead, he's retreated from the cold and taken a post just inside the door, where he occasionally glances out a narrow window. As an Arkham stakeholder, Bruce shouldn't dismiss a lapse in professional behavior, but it allows him and John to speak as freely as they like.

"I think this is the longest you've visited!" John comments.

Bruce replies dryly, "I'm going for the record."

"Don't think you'll beat it. Decades ago, a tyke ran away from home and snuck into the ladies' wing to see her mom. The inmates managed to hide the kid for four days before a nurse discovered her."

"And?"

"And what?"

"Usually these stories end with something terrible. 'Yadda yadda.'"

"Heh, surprise twist! Girl was fine– well, slightly malnourished since the patients could only sneak so much food. Logs say Dad picked her up and Mom got demerits. Boring, actually."

"I think it's the food that would keep me from trying to beat the record."

"But you got us a pizza day!"

"Merry Christmas," Bruce says with a smile.

John smiles back, then he bursts into giggles and looks away, tucking the lower half of his face behind his upturned collar.

When Bruce arrived today, they gave each other homemade Christmas cards, and that was the extent of their gift exchange. Materially, Bruce doesn't want for anything, and supporting institutional improvements gets John his essential needs. There have been some presents– the nonflashy items from Bruce, crafty trinkets from John– but most of what the two share are these visits: rambling conversations, card game victories, unsaid secrets, snack ratings, workshopped jokes, garden strolls, knowing glances.

John likes the attention, and Bruce likes giving it to him. Bruce likes how the coat envelops John, makes him look warm and protected (even if he can protect himself just fine). John is still chuckling behind the collar, and the way his eyes keep flicking to Bruce can't be anything but coy.

Bruce shouldn't question this.

Harley isn't around to disrupt their relationship anymore. There are no more regrettable deceptions. Wide-spread disasters haven't breached these walls. The two men have had so many routine hours to focus on each other.

John's laughter peters out, and he emerges from the coat. "So what ritzy holiday parties is our debonair bachelor attending?"

"Same ones as last year," Bruce replies. "Not much has changed in the high-society pecking order. I'll just make brief appearances."

"I had an idea, since you don't like parties. You throw your own party, but you keep the guest list exclusive and secret– so no one knows you didn't invite anyone!"

"That's one solution." It could even work. Enough people would certainly lie and claim they'd been there. "It's not so bad if you have a good plus-one. I'd definitely enjoy myself more if you were there."

John's braying laughter bounces off the towering walls. "As if visiting me doesn't wag enough tongues!"

Bruce shrugs. "No real consequences. It would just make us the centerpiece of the night."

"Hm, I better have a knockout suit, then." John breathes warm air into his gloved hands as he thinks. "I'd go spezzato. Violet jacket and yellow pants– golden yellow– with a black shirt, and the tie..."

"Orchid? With an actual orchid on your lapel."

"Is that a winter flower? Oh, who cares. It sounds sharp! And we'd show up in a stretch limo just for us, already tipsy from splitting all the booze."

"Of course."

"And we'll have a karaoke machine."

"Yeah, the von Wellingtons won't have booked one."

"Tsk! Next you'll say they don't have a Santa piñata. Santiñata?"

"This turned into quite the date."

"Date?" John repeats, his grin dropping.

It's a slip of the tongue, easily recoverable. But in a beat of quiet, the familiar urge to retreat loses to another impulse. It's past time, isn't it?

"Yes," Bruce says. He brings their walk to a halt and they face each other. "If you'd like that."

John's smile creeps back, smaller, cautious. "Really?"

Bruce nods. 

And the smile breaks wide. "I, uh… Sure?" John giggles with an attempt at a casual shrug. "Sure, sounds good. You know, whatever."

Bruce removes his hands from his pockets. He holds John's shoulders and leans in with his own smile. "Would you like me to kiss you?"

For a moment, John just keeps laughing, but then his arms latch around Bruce's shoulders and neck, and their mouths collide. Bruce returns the kiss even while fighting to keep from toppling back into a snow-dappled hedge– but John is unconcerned about their balance. He grapples to have Bruce closer, and in the next moment, Bruce lands on top of John in three inches of snow.

Nevertheless, John's grip is locked, and Bruce plants his hands in the snow and indulges the kiss until the chill bleeds through his leather gloves.

He lifts his head and chuckles at John's serene expression. "Aren't you cold?"

"Nnnnope!" John says, snuggling into Bruce's neck.

"I'm impressed, but I don't want you to get sick."

"Oh, but we're already sick," John says, trying to keep as much contact as possible as Bruce gets them to their feet. "Heart palpitations, dizziness, flushed skin..."

"I don't suppose there's a cure." Bruce brushes the snow off the back of John's coat.

"Nope, there's only management," John says, his grin going wicked as he rises on his toes.

Bruce smirks, delaying the second kiss. "What's the first step?"

"Cooling measures!"

A handful of snow splats on the side of Bruce's face, the icy shock followed by the absence of John's body heat. He's run for cover behind a tree trunk.

The snowball fight lasts a couple minutes before the orderly opens the door and stammers that it's against the policy for inmate conduct. Bruce breezily apologizes and doesn't argue when they're asked to come inside. After so long, he can feel it when visiting time is coming to a close, so he dusts the snow off John a second time before himself.

The illusion of their own little world is gone, but John's happy hum lifts the melancholy as he tucks himself under Bruce's arm. As they head inside, Bruce kisses the drops of melted snow from John's temple and tastes their brightness.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy holidays, y'all.


End file.
